ROLE OF BIOTECHNOLOGY IN THE IMPROVEMENT

OF FIBER CROPS

Presented By

Majid Ali Sher

Plant Breeding & Genetics

MNS-university of agriculture, multan
Road Map

 What is biotechnology
• History & importance
 Fiber crops
• Cotton crop and its breeding objectives
• Role of biotechnology in improvement of cotton crop
• Review
• Future target traits
• Genes Identified And Induced In Cotton Recently.
• Obstacle To Cotton Crop Improvement Through Gene Transfer
 Flax (review of biotechnology)
 Potential Risks Of GM Fiber Crops
• Clean gene technology
 Conclusion
 References
 What is Biotechnology?

 Biotechnology is the use of biological processes, organisms, or systems to

manufacture products intended to improve the quality of human life (Grace,
2006).

 Genetically modified crops are plants used in agriculture, the DNA of which
has been modified with genetic engineering techniques, in order to introduce
a new trait to the plant which does not occur naturally in the species.
 HISTORY

 Plant biotechnology is founded on the principles of cellular totipotency and

genetic transformation (Cell Theory of Schleiden and Schwann,1838).

 In 1990 -The first food product of biotechnology (a yeast used for baking)
appeared on the market.

 In 2003, 7 million farmers in 18 countries were growing GM crops.

 In 2016, global hectarage of biotech crops increased from 179.7 million hectares
to 185.1 million hectares.
(Global status of GM crops ISAAA, 2016)
 IMPORTANCE

 It enables improvements not possible with traditional crossing of related

species alone.

 Represents unique applications of science with improved nutritional quality,

resistance to pests and diseases, and reduced cost of production.

 It allows incorporation of more than one trait, called stacked traits.

 It can play a significant role in the global community’s need to adapt to potential
impacts of climate change on current agricultural production.
 FIBER CROPS

 Cotton, as the foremost commercially important fiber crop of high

economic value.

 Jute, a versatile, environment friendly and most important vegetable fibre

crop in the world next to cotton in terms of usage, global consumption,
production and availability.

 Flax, also known as common flax or linseed, unspun fiber crop used
as linen in Western countries.
COTTON
 Cotton, Gossypium spp., is the most important natural fiber source for the
textile industry and is a major cash crop in 70 countries.

 Rich in oil (18 – 24%) and protein (20 – 40%).

 Cottonseed oil and cake are secondary products of cotton.

 Cottonseed meal is fed to poultry.

 Being long duration crop, is prone to more biotic & abiotic stresses.

(Sukumar Saha, 2011)

BREEDING OBJECTIVES

 Improved Fiber yield.

 Improved Fiber quality.

 Rapid fruiting & Early maturity.

 Resistance to biotic stresses.

 Resistance to abiotic stresses (Drought and heat)

 Improved Seed quality.

ROLE OF BIOTECHNOLOGY IN COTTON IMPROVMENT

 Bt cotton, 1996 (Cry1Ac),

 Bollgard® 2 cotton (Cry1Ac &Cry2Ab).

 Bollgard® 3 cotton or VipCot.(Vip3A).

 Roundup Ready Flex® cotton (GTCOT).

 Stacked varieties (BGRR).

 Biotech cotton planted on 93% of the total cotton area, comprised of 4% IR,
9% HT, and 80% stacked IR/HT (ISAAA, 2016).
FUTURE TARGET TRAITS

 Disease resistance aganist e.g. Verticillium wilt, Root knot Nematodes,

CLCV.

 Abiotic stress resistance e.g. Drought and Heat tolerance.

 Fiber quality e.g. Length, strength, fineness and dyeing.

 REVIEW

 Genes that would be useful for fiber quality include hormone genes from
Agrobacterium, biopolymer genes from Alcaligenes eutrophus and genes
encoding several cell wall protein (G. Balasubramani, 2000).

 RNAi technology will also have great impact in improving seed quality as a food
source and also in providing resistance genes against pests and diseases including
nematodes (Niu et al., 2010).

 Gossypium arborium has been exploited for isolation and incorporation of

resistant genes into susceptible varieties by genetic transformation
(farooq et al., 2011).
 Cont.....

 Molecular markers associated with cotton leaf curl virus disease resistance can
enhance the selection efficiency in breeding programmes (Farooq et al., 2011).

 Knowledge gained from decoding the cotton genome will improve understanding of
genes at the molecular levels and help to unlock the mystery of genetics for
improving yield and fiber quality (Sukumar Saha, 2011).

 Park et al. (2012) identified several genes expressed under drought stress in cotton
(G. hirsutum L.).

 We need to improve a variety of cotton with superior dyebinding, thermal and

surface properties to make it more versatile fibre for textile industry
(Michael R. Stiff, 2016).
Genes Recently Identified And Induced In Cotton Transgenically

Genes identified Trait Reference

GhHS126 and GhHS128 Heat Tolerance U. Demeril et al., 2014.

ScALDH21, TsVP, Yang et al., 2016

AtEDT1/HDG11 Drought Tolerent Liu et al. 2014
SNAC1, AVP1 Pasapula et al., 2011
Osmotin, betA Lv et al., 2007 and 2009.

CG02 Verticilliam wilt resistant Tinggang Li et al., 2017.

fqFBS-c3, qSFI-c14, Fiber quality Xihua Li. et al., 2016

qUHML-c14 and qUHML-
c24 and CotAD_28189
Obstacle To Cotton Crop Improvement Through Gene Transfer

 Lack of efficient regeneration protocol through somatic embryogenesis.

 Genotype specificity (like Coker lines).

 Maintenance of genetic uniformity in plants regenerated in vitro.

 Low transformation frequencies .

 Costly and time consuming.

 Cont.....

 Other methods such as transformation and regeneration from

meristematic tissues of cotton have been found useful (Zapata et al.,
1999).

 AtWUS gene from Arabidopsis enhanced the expression of

embryogenic competence and triggered organogenesis (O. Bouchabke,
2013).

 Particle delivery gene transfer systems facilitates the transformation of

commercial cotton genotypes thereby eliminating the need for
backcrossing with a regenerable genotype (Dewang et aI., 1998).
FLAX
 A food and fiber crop cultivated in cooler regions of the world.

 First commodity crop species to be genetically engineered by recombinant

DNA technologies (Hepburn et al. 1983).

 Wijayanto and McHughen (1999) documented a successful biolistic

process to regenerate transgenic linseed from bombarded hypocotyls
cultured on a standard selection medium.

 Rutkowska-Krause et al. (2003) compared the regeneration of flax plants

from anther culture and somatic tissues and established a flax regeneration
system providing a basis for the creation of transgenic flax.
 Cont.....

 Musialak et al. (2008) aimed at generating transgenic flax plants that could
be retted more efficiently.

 The improved properties of fibres from genetically modified flax containing

genes coding enzymes of PHB synthesis were studied also by Wróbel-
Kwiatkowska et al. (2012).

 Agrobacterium transformation of flax via floral dip could replace the

previously used techniques for flax transformation, because of its simplicity,
low cost and high transformation rate (Bastaki & Cullis,2014) .
Potential Risks Of GM Fiber Crops
 The potential transfer of genes from HRCs to wild or semi-domesticated
relatives thus creating super weeds.
 HRC volunteers become weeds in subsequent crops.
 Vector-mediated horizontal gene transfer and recombination to create new
pathogenic bacteria.
 Vector recombination to generate new virulent strains of virus, especially in
trangenic plants engineered for viral resistance with viral genes.
 Insect pests will quickly develop resistance to crops with Bt toxin.
 Massive use of Bt toxin in crops can unleash potential negative interactions on
non-target organisms including beneficial insects and soil biota.
 CLEAN GENE TECHNOLOGY

The process of developing transgenic plants without the presence of

selectable markers or by use of more acceptable marker genesis to avoid
possible risks of GM crops on agroecosystem such as

 Site-Specific Recombination systems

 Relocation of transgenes via transposable elements
 Co-cultivation with multiple T-DNA
 Transformation without selection marker gene
 Targeted gene replacement
 CONCLUSION

Biotechnology provides extraordinarily powerful tools and can generate

products that have a tremendous commercial application in the near and
distant future. Recent advances are now focusing on the specific areas on
the role of biotechnology in cotton improvement considering its great
impact i.e. RNAi technology and cotton genome sequencing to unlock the
secrets of genetics for the improvement of cotton.
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